Isolation to Continue Pending Review

The full Supreme Court today endorsed the earlier one-Justice stay of the 9th Circuit's order in Bush v. Gherebi. That means that the detainees will not be informed that the Supreme Court, or anyone, is considering their situation. They can rot in limbo some more.

While it's in no way surprising that the Supreme Court should preserve the status quo pending its decision—indeed it's the only thing it could do given the government's claim of irreparable harm to national security—it is a little surprising that Solicitor General Olson is prepared to sign a brief stating (according to AP) that national security would be damaged by notice that the Supreme Court granted cert.

Communication with the prisoner would “interfere with the military's efforts to obtain intelligence from Gherebi and other Guantanamo detainees related to the ongoing war against terrorism,” Olson wrote in an emergency filing last week.

Seems somewhat implausible that these mid- and low- and very low-level folks have anything of value to say after this long, doesn't it?